I ) 9 OlUHcj _ 






LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 



a _ _ ^ 

i UNITED STATES OP AMERICA, i 



CHAEIOLES 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 



AUTHOR OF LYXERIA. 



B O STON: 
TICK NOR AND FIELDS. 

M DCOC I.VI. 






Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1856, by 
J. P. QUINCY, 

in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts. 



RIVERSIDE, CAMBRIDGE: 

STEREOTYPED AND PRINTED BY 

H. 0. HOUGHTON AND COMPANY. 



PREFACE. 



The structure of the following drama is in- 
tended to resemble that of the Greek tragedy. 
It is written upon an event, rather than a plot ; 
the scene is laid in the open air before the 
temporary abode of royalty, and the action is 
limited to a single night. The attempt has 
been made to invest a character with some- 
thing of the dignity and moral power of the 
tragic chorus. The division into acts is in 
compliance with modern usage ; the pauses 
being no longer than those that must be sup- 
posed in many of the best models of classic 
composition. 

(5) 



INTRODUCTION. 



There are few instances of retributive justice more 
solemnly striking, than may be gathered from notices of 
the death of the third Caesar, in the writings of Suetonius 
and Tacitus. A vigorous constitution, strengthened by the 
simple habits of early life, enabled Tiberius for a time to re- 
sist, not only the diseases that his later excesses poured upon 
him, but also the poison that was covertly administered by 
those in the interest of his successor. Stung and nettled by 
the taunts and execrations that arose about him, we read, that 
the dying tyrant would at one time strive to conceal the depth 
of his infamies, and at another, for very despair, would pub- 
lish them in reckless bravado to the world. Feeble in body 
and a prey to superstitious fears, Tiberius journeyed for the 
last time towards Rome. Frightened by a fancied prodigy, 
and seized by mortal illness, that he dared not acknowlege to 
those about him, the emperor, when within sight of the city, 
turned suddenly, and gave the order to press back again to 
Capri. By increasing the extravagance of his debaucher- 
ies, by an occasional display of physical power, and by the 
constant scorn with which he affected to treat his physician, 
Charicles, the unhappy man sought to disguise his true condi- 
tion from Caligula and his adherents. In vain, however, was 
every artifice — his death was too surely seen to be approach- 
ing; and finally Charicles acknowledged to those about him that 

(?) 



Vlll INTRODUCTION. 

the end must soon come. For this event measures were imme- 
diately taken — councils were held in private and despatches 
sent to the army and its commanders. Efforts were once made 
to induce Tiberius to appoint a successor ; but even in the ago- 
nies of death, he grasped the signet ring strongly upon his 
hand, and refused to allow it to be taken. Yet not only was the 
tortured monarch made to realize the plots formed against him, 
and the contempt of those who should have been bound to 
his interest by personal favor and lavish liberality; but a 
punishment of strange severity was reserved for him. For 
upon recovering from a fainting fit, that had been mistaken 
for death, he found Caligula clothed with the insignia of roy- 
alty, and surrounded by a band of fawning courtiers. The 
whole party, paralyzed with terror at his unexpected resusci- 
tation, for a time gazed stupidly upon the maddened tyrant. 
Finally, Tiberius was thrown upon a bed, where, at the order 
of Macro, he was deprived of life by suffocation. 

Most of the incidents, as will be seen by a reference to the 
note at the close of the volume, are to be found in the histo- 
rians already mentioned. A slight dramatic license has been 
taken in their arrangement and amplification. 

The characters of Tiberius and his successor are intended 
to be consistent with their historical representation — the for- 
mer having, as we are assured, something of the scholar and 
the poet mingled with the voluptuary, the tyrant, and the 
atheist ; and the latter screening at times his detestable qual- 
ties under a crafty pretence of modesty and moderation. 

In writing the part of Charicles, who is simply mentioned 
as a physician in the train of Tiberius, not employed to pre- 
scribe, but assisting with friendly advice, the imagination may 
be allowed some liberty. So likewise in Ennia, the wife of 
Macro, historically known as mistress and promised empress 
of Caligula. 



DRAMATIS PERSONS. 

Tiberius. 

Caius (Lesar Caligula. 

Charicles. 

Lucullus. 

Crassus. 
Ennia. 

The scene is an open space before the villa of Lucullus. At 
the base of the hill upon which the villa stands, are buildings 
for the accommodation of soldiers, retainers, and others. The 
action commences about sunset. 

(9) 



ACT L 

LuculluS) Crassus. 

LUCULLUS. 

Commands he then the shelter of our villa 
For a night only ? 

CRASSUS. 

This, I cannot tell ; 
For a strange madness sways Tiberius now, 
And none may guess his pleasure ; when we stood 
Scarcely two leagues from Rome, with travel spent, 
And joyed to see her domes and palaces 
Indent our northern sky — the Emperor, 
Gazing upon the city, staggered back 
As if Fate's finger touched him ; — straight he cried, 
" Turn all our horses, we'll again to Capri ! " 
And so, unkemped and wearied, back we toil, 
Till some fresh freak shall seize him, or till Death, 

(id 



I 2 CHARICLES : 

The only Brutus left these craven times, 
Shall dare to strike the monster. 

LUCXJLLUS. 

Soft, I pray, 
We may not yet give word unto the hope 
That eager dwells within us. 

CRASSUS. 

Nay, the end 
Hurries upon him, although desperate will 
Still wields the body. At Circejus here, 
In the full circus, when all eyes grew bright 
As the speech faded on his rigid lip, 
And pain's dull gripe wrinkled his face in sufferance, 
Two massive lances from the guards he snatched, 
Rushed to the front, and shouting to the crowd 
u Caesar is mighty yet ! "— 
With certain aim transfixed the panting boar, 
That made the soldiers pastime. Nerving thus 
His arm to one great effort that drained off 
The dying strength of nature, back he reeled, 
And carried by his hirelings, left the games 
A shattered mass of grossness. 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 13 



LUCULLUS. 

Charicles 
Was with him when he fell ? 

CRASSUS. 

Yes ; to recall 
A life that crimsons the hard cheek of earth, 
And shames the patient heaven ! Strange it is 
That wise physician — whose well-governed mind 
And vigorous frame conjure the chains that time 
Binds on his latter years, and show them garlands — 
Strange such as he should use his hard-earned skill, 
To cheat infernal gods of their ripe victim ! 

LUCULLUS. 

'Tis whispered here that comradeship of youth, 
When this luxurious reveller bore arms 
Nobly against the Germans, knit so close 
The love of Charicles to this our tyrant, 
That now, — of all the crowd of sycophants, 
Soldiers, relations, courtesans, who press 
About the dying monarch, — he alone 
Stands firm and faithful to keep back the throng, 



1± CHARICLES : 

Who curse the lagging energies of life, 
And aid the fates to do their welcome office. 

CRASSUS. 

The ring of soldier's steel breaks from below ! 
The horsemen, that by some half-hour precede 
The Emperor, already fill the court. 

LUCULLUS. 

Can he be Macro who still sits his steed 

While all descend about him ? — no ; he wants 

The crafty courtesy that could supplant 

The powerful Sejanus ! — Dignity 

That cannot palter, in his stillness lives. 

A knight detains his stirrup — Ah, his step 

To earth wears cautiousness like age. He speaks 

To those about him, while he bares his head 

In salutation. Whitened locks like those 

Mark only one in all the monarch's train. 

'Tis the physician Charicles ! 

CRASSUS. 

His mien 
Cannot be counterfeit : It is indeed 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 15 

That brave old man who hither bends his steps. 

The freshness and the vigorous trust of youth 

Still cling about him, as the kindly vine 

With its fond verdure wraps the storm-stripped trunk 

In richer beauty, than when summer birds 

Wantoned among its branches. He displays 

A virtue not of impulse, or that temper 

Whose native mien shows fairly, — but has grown 

To all that men should honor by hard toil 

And daily self-denial. As we praise 

The fair conception that the artist strikes 

From shapeless matter — rudely shivering 

And tearing without pity through the rock, 

Until his thought toils slowly into form — 

So let us reverence him who doth not spare 

To chafe and rend his being, till it shrink 

To beauty more divine than any craft 

Can mimic to the sense. 

LUCULLUS. 

This Charicles, — 
So have I heard, and your report confirms, — 
Deserves the high commending of a man 
Who dares revere a truth, before the crowd 



1 G CIIARICLES : 

Are scourged to worship it, — whose loyalty 
To true nobility ungarlanded 
Is ever constant — yet whose generous heart 
Hoodwinks his judgment to the benefit 
Even of this Tiberius. 

CRASSUS. 

He is here ; — 
Few of our modern youth who climbed that hill 
Would breathe so easily. 

{Enter Charicles.) 

You speed to-day ; 
We thought that Charicles could ill be spared 
By his great patient. But perhaps even now 
Rome's prayers are answered, and Tiberius lies 
Beyond the help of leech-craft. 

CHARICLES. 

Sir, he lives ; 
And in a sudden gust of strength that Will 
Drove through the shrinking fibres, spurned my aid, 
And bade me quit his presence ; lest the people, 
While a physician waited at his side, 
Should fancy Caesar mortal ! 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 17 



CRASSUS. 

Stay not then 
A moment in this villa ! — he will repent 
This rashness, and again demand thy arm 
To battle off his doom. Leave him to those 
Who dare not stay the vengeance the high gods 
Devise for their blasphemers. 

CHARICLES. 

I must not 
Desert the final moments of a man 
Whom friendship past has dowered with a claim, 
That in his sad necessity dispels 
The difference of years. We combatted 
Together by the Rhine ; and earlier still 
In that fierce Rhsetian war when the rough Alps 
Leagued all their bulk against us. I have seen 
Tiberius, tentless, stretched upon the earth, 
While meanest soldiers with their blankets screened 
Cold starlight from their faces ! Through long nights 
He gave command that any who had doubt 
Of the next day's success, should break his rest, 
And hear him tell again the well-laid plans 
2 



18 CHARICLES : 

That promised victory. Our studies too 
Waked better sympathy : the Caesars hold 
A spirit quick to seize what lesser men 
By grappling and hard toil with grief attain, 
And his bright wit, quick-flashing on the task, 
Dispersed all doubts that shrouded the coy truth. 

LTJCULLUS. 

Methinks that Charicles may claim discharge 
From old indebtedness, in saving him 
Whom Rome calls master, from a blacker deed 
Than history shall whisper. I have heard, 
From one who served at Capri, of a feast 
Where poison lurking in the wine-brimmed cups, 
Should banquet all to silence — had not he 
Who planned this infamy, summoned in haste 
A certain skilled physician, who prepared 
An antidote, that saved the guilty man 
From his own vile contriving. 

CHARICLES. 

Such report 
May be as empty as the thousand tales 
Men fable of their rulers. When we know 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 19 

The open baseness of this sullied man, 

We need not crimes that secret rumorers breathe 

To make our pity fuller. 

CRASSUS. 

Hast thou then 
No harsher word than pity, for this scourge 
Of the vexed earth ! this mercy-mocking fiend ! 

OHARICLES. 

None, none, sir, — for he suffers. While the gods 

Delayed their retribution, there was room 

For other feeling. Now, when every grief 

Pours on his naked head — when thick'ning pangs 

Gnaw through the aching frame — and the hot thoughts, 

Surging in chaos, rise and beat against 

The rock where reason lingers — when the men, 

Who fawned upon his greatness, plot his death — 

And friendless, helpless Age in sorrow drifts 

To that dark ocean, where unsightly wrecks 

Of powers that cursed their holder, heave and toss 

In ghastly impotence — then, anger melts, 

Leaving compassion, awe, and tenderness. 



20 CHARICLES : 



CRASSUS. 

Yonder are those untouched by any sense 
That dulls their instant profit — Caius Caesar, 
And with him Ennia, whom he promises 
Success shall make his empress ! 

CHARICLES. 

Let me then 
Withdraw unnoticed, for the Emperor 
Must arrive speedily. I would put off 
This garment soiled by travel, and prepare 
To minister in these emergencies. 

LUCULLUS. 

Then follow, sir, our villa welcomes all — 
Though Caius would not seek to shelter one 
Who comes to guard what he, for greater cause 
Than doth possess us all, plots to destroy ; 
While Macro's haughty and ungoverned wife, 
Sold by her lord's ambition and her own, 
Shall brook thy presence little : — So have care, 
Her hate may prove most deadly ! 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 21 



CHARICLES. 

Fear thee not ; 
For I have marked this woman, and observed 
Her spirit swell beneath indignities, 
Which to the world she carries mockingly. 
In her there fails that mediating sense 
To temper down the bright ideal of thought, 
That it may warm to healthiness the life 
Scorched by excess of lustre. She is formed 
Of fine perceptions, through which every breath 
Vibrates to joy or agony unknown 
To coarse and passionless existences. 
Such beings are developed in convulsion : 
Their energies unused refuse to rust, 
But do ferment and strive for mastership. 
Strange, to confess the thousand accidents 
That make us as we are ! — Do we part here ? 

LUCULLTJS. 

This way for thee. I go below to greet 
The Emperor : his coming will be sudden. 

{Exeunt Lucullm and Ckaricles.) 



22 CHARIOLES : 

CRASSUS. 

How hardly stands the time when we must hail 
These selfish plotters, who for private gain 
Would push Tiberius to his eager grave, 
As Rome's best patriots ; when our fingers yearn 
To doff our caps to this Caligula, 
As one whose very blackness must show fair, 
Contrasted with that arch-oppressor's wrongs, 
That scourge the patient earth to bitterness ! 
(Enter Gains Ccesar and Ennia.) 

CAIUS. 

Ha, Crassus ! Was it Charicles who left thee ? 

CRASSUS. 

Ay, sir, he came but now. 

CAIUS. 

Mistake ! mistake ! 
He should have fled to Rome— -out of the reach 
Of daily insult and indignity, 
That pays his care to lengthen out a life, 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 23 

Whose blood coins riches for the man who steals it. 
Speed after him, say I have words to speak 
That shall ring profit ! Quickly bid him come ! 

[Exit Crassus. 
Foiled by this nian again ! when I have gained 
The popular voice, which may to-morrow call 
A rival to take up the falling crown. 
The guards, as yet fresh-bribed, are well prepared 
To hail me monarch. 'Tis to-night — this night — 
The sluggish deputation from the senate, 
Bought by long fawning, should arrive to wait 
His death, to call me instantly to fill 
The lofty seat he drops from : — and this night 
The old man dies ! This must be compassed, must, 
Despite this crafty leech who long enough 
Hath shut us from our hope. 

ENNIA. 

Tiberius drained 
The drugs that Macro mixed, and yet defies thee : — 
Truly our Charicles bears spells that raise 
Immortal aid to thwart thy purposes. 



24 oharicles : 

CAIUS. 

He must be gained at any sacrifice ; 
And, Ennia, thou canst do it. Well I know 
The crafty words and winning speciousness 
Of a shrewd woman — and a fair one too. 
Thy weapons are more delicate and sure, 
Than bribes and threats that I might vainly use 
In pressing this great suit. 

ENNIA. 

Here is one man 
Might stand uncovered in the blaze of day, 
And let the wholesome sunshine search him through, 
To show no fleck upon him ! Canst thou not 
Find better uses for these purchased wiles. 
Than to obscure the single honest light 
By which we gauge our proper infamies ! 

CAIUS. 

Waste not these doughty words on him who twirls 
Thee and thy future as a brittle reed 
Between his fingers ! Thou art mine. Reflect 
How I could bruise the life that I have sworn 
Shall wear imperial greatness ! 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 25 



ENNIA. 

As thou say'st, 
I am most helpless. On and upward then — 
It is my course and thine. If I have skill 
In reading stubborn men, no promises 
Of profit, or foreshadowed retribution 
Can sway this Charicles — impregnable 
On all parts, save that spot where honor waves 
Her insubstantial sceptre. But let me 
(If fortune so far help us) show him cause 
Why this man's death must truly glorify 
Him who invites it — show that both his gods 
And feeble senators will count him blest, 
Whose hand frees Rome from Capri's guilty lord,- 
And he is ours to use ! 

CAIUS. 

And having used, 
To punish, for the days of hope deferred 
That he hath cost us. I shall call thee empress 
Ere the dead east shall redden ; but to-night, 
We work ! No sleep or revel must intrude 
Betwixt our deed and hope. We father still 



26 charicles : 

The future in the present, and our fate 

Is not stretched out before us, but is shot 

By our own effort through the blank hereafter, 

Where only fools run blindly. Charicles 

Returns : to thy persuading I may owe 

The crown we both shall wear. Be resolute 

In every subtle art that captives men 

From their own judgment. Ennia ! I trust thee. 

\Exit Caius Ccesar. 

ENNIA. 

I shall be faithful, and will have success 

If mortal art can reach it. Then away, 

Thou image and perception of a fate, 

That wanders cruelly before my steps, 

Showing a sad, calm glory which doth mock 

My flushed and squandered being ! Let me quell 

The phantom, and press on — 

And in a mazy whirl of vivid life, 

Surfeit this restless soul. Our Charicles 

Worships that servile spirit, which resigns 

Fortune's best gifts for some fantastic good 

Begot in reason's dotage. He bows not 

With other men to the unbending will 

Of him who triumphs ; but refuses still 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 27 

To pay the natural tribute which the crowd 
Render stern purpose, that breaks destiny, 
And dazzles men with what it steals from them. 
He is of those to whom substantial things, 
Clouded by fancy, seem as mockeries — 
And who would sway the universe by dreams 
That die upon their acting. 

(Unter Charicles.) 

It shows ill, 
Physician, when such reverent locks appear 
'Midst curled and scented parasites. We thought 
That spurned by this mad patient, thou had'st fled 
Beyond recalling, that his folly might 
Glare on his dying eyes. 

CHARICLES. 

Until the last 
I wait beside him. The physician sees 
Poor nature stripped of all the snares she throws, 
In her bright hours, for fickle sympathy. 
All hearts can feel when loveliness is touched 
With the quick shaft of sorrow — -when the soul 
Quits earth in perfumed robes of sentiment, 
And genius, dolphin-like, from the dull lash 



28 charicles : 

Of its own agony weaves robes of light, 
And bleeds in changing beauty ; — but when pain 
Strikes vulgar want or selfish luxury, — 
When the torn breast bares to the gazer's view 
Vice, cruelty, and wretchedness, that strive 
And mutiny 'gainst fainting reason, — -then 
'Tis our place to stand firmly, and support 
"With human pity what remains of man, 
To kind oblivion. 

ENNIA. 

So dost thou wrong- 
Snatching the healing cordials of the earth 
To pour through bloated veins, while younger lives, 
Still capable of good, perish unheeded ! 

CHARICLES. 

He who hath knowledge to renerve the pulse, 
May not thence arrogate the power to give 
Or hold his skill, from any suffering. 
All life alike claims his large sympathy : 
The dews of heaven the sombre cypress feed, 
Like the gay poppy. 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 29 

ENNIA. 

A starved Pestilence 
Sits pressing his foul lip, and from his breath 
Drinks hateful sustenance ! Thy fatal spell, 
That holds this sordid life, oppresses earth. 
The senate has defied him, and the throng 
Run wildly in the streets, and call aloud 
That his dead bones — for oft his death is rumored — 
Be thrown like carrion to the yellow stream 
That cleanses Rome. Tiberius to the Tiber — 
This is the cry that dies upon the breeze 
That even now sweeps by us. As a god 
Shall he be worshipped, who the state shall free 
From this incumbent horror. Caius Caesar, 
Whom nobles, senate, people, long to crown, 
Shall hold him in his heart, who boldly strikes 
The blow to-night ; — or but forgets to shield 
Tiberius from the hands that are not shamed 
To do their country service ! — 

Charicles, 
I thought to have been temperate in my speech — 
But craft and cautiousness fit not the time 
Or business. Freely have I spoken ; — so 
Return thou answer. 



30 charicles : 



CIIARICLES. 

The blanched locks I wear 
Should cover no ambition. As the ear 
Dulls to the harmonies of sense, the words 
Of sober duty closely press themselves 
About the listening heart. Transgression must 
Scourge its fooled victim — though its knotted whips 
Fret not those younger days, when our fresh strength 
Leaps laughingly to pleasure's winning pipe. — 
Thou art most beautiful ; — I cannot think 
That even Capri can have all debauched 
A soul enshrined thus fairly. Do not seek 
To bitter the high place that shall be thine 
By shedding royal blood — tho' thick with guilt — 
That thee and thine has patroned. 

ENNIA. 

While we speak, 
The young Tiberius hurries to the side 
Of the crazed dotard, who. in some mad freak 
May lift him to the throne ; — then there must flow 
More blood and richer, than supplies the veins 
Of one shrunk tyrant ! 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 31 

CHARICLES. 

Nay, if as thou say'st 
The empire claim thy Caius for her lord, 
Be sure that her great voice shall drown the cries 
Of a dream-flattered youth. My daily craft 
Has given skill to read the signs that Death 
Stamps on the brow of the worn wretch he bids 
To slumber in his chambers. Ere the sun 
Shall thrice revisit us, this man shall lie 
Beyond the thrust of malice. Do not snatch 
So rudely at a life, that while we speak 
Melts from between thy hope and its fulfilment. 
{Re-enter Caius Ocesar.) 

CAIUS. 

Hast thou sped well ? Speak, woman, 

For our stained uncle, stung with pain and travel, 

Now rages in the court ! Physician, say, 

Is our suit granted ? 

CHARICLES. 

What is honest, sir, 
There needs no suit to press. Proposals base 



82 charicles : 

Cling not to my remembrance ; and perchance 
The sight of this grieved man, whose failing steps 
His menials scarce support to where we stand, 
Shall banish them from yours, and turn this guilt 
To sober admiration at the doom 
The god-defier tastes. 

The Emperor ! 
(Enter Tiberius, attended. He is followed by 
Lucullus, and many others.) 

TIBERIUS. 

Hail, friends ! Ha, Charicles, what brought thee here ? 
Twas not my order. Take thy face from hence ! 
Our tree, though something bent, is still well sapped, 
And needs no gardening. Speed thee to Rome — 
There suck the purses of the credulous crowd, 
The food of priests and doctors ! 

CHARICLES. 

As a friend, 
An early and a true one, I entreat 
Your leave to tarry. 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 33 



TIBERIUS. 

As a friend, then, stay — 
For we have need of such. 'Tis said the people 
Armed with petitions, ay, and with clubs too, 
Pour from the neighboring country to besiege 
Our final night on their curst continent ! 
To-morrow's dawn embarks us all for Capri. 
If thou dost stay, bewitch thy sober face 
With wine and garlands ; or if thou wilt deign 
The reek of slaughter won with ruder arms 
Than thy familiar physic — -join my guards, 
And hew these beggars to the thirsty earth, 
Which from plebeian blood elaborates 
A blooming vesture to out-do and shame 
Our gewgawed lemans ! 

Orders were despatched 
To have a banquet ready ! Is it served ? — 
I have heard something of the sunny grape, 
Whose essence cribbed in your sealed jars too long, 
Craves resurrection to renew its summer 
In these chilled hearts we bear. Am I not answered ! 
Is't ready! Ha! 

3 



34 CHARICLES : 



LUCULLUS. 

The nimble servants speed 
With loyalty still anxious in your service. 
Our tables bending with their choicest load 
Shall soon invite your highness. But this coming 
Was something sudden. We entreat your patience. 

TIBERIUS. 

'Twas not well done ! Feasts constantly replenished 
Should have awaited us. When we descend 
From our fair island, and do deign to tread 
The vulgar earth men live on, you should know 
How Caesar must be welcomed ! 

Ennia, 
Mix for me wine as thou wert wont at Capri, 
And bring it straight, for faintness is upon me ! Haste, I say ! 

[Exit Ennia. 
See there our doctor ; how from far he smells 
His chance of meddling profit. Keep thy drugs 
For slaves and frightened women ! Know our faintness 
Is caused by travel — and already passes ; 
What canst thou do, poor leech ! — fatten on fools ! 
When the time comes, we die. 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 35 

CHARICLES. 

Ay, sir, we die. 
But if the time should lag, man can select 
Some drug whose active potency is proved 
Swift to wind up the hours ; — and when the pulse 
Strikes off a day at every maddening beat, 
He can choose yet again, and with a drop, 
Distilled from other vegetable life, 
Undo the deadly errand of the first. 
Holds Caesar not, unrecognized, perchance, 
Some old example in his memory 
That fits the saying ! 

TIBERIUS. 

Cease thy prating, peace ! 
I keep no memories : — but for a jest, 
I'll practise thee with seeming, and feign aches 
And knotted cramps, that shall thy craft o'erwhelm ! 
Say on this spot a gnawing horror pressed 
Storming the seat of life, and sending forth, 
'Gainst this dependency and that, fierce pains 
That burned into the flesh. Say that this brow 
Pent in a sullen madness, that must soon 
Burst through the cracking flood-gates of the will, 



oG C1IARICLES : 

And rage in every fibre — that this hand 
Uncertain, palsied, could no longer clutch 
The potency that warmed the sluggish clay 
With a faint show of being — add to all 
A tortured consciousness, weak to repel 
The blazing thoughts that a blood-craving fate 
Rained thick upon the brain ! — If such a wretch, 
Steeped thus in fullest aggregate of woe, 
Cumbered the earth — what couldst thou do for him ? 

CHAKICLES. 

Nothing ; — but smooth the painful path to death. 

TIBERIUS. 

Art thou foiled now ! drug then the foolish crowd — 
When evils league to crush a monarch's life, 
They scorn man's frail resistance. Yet thou know'st 
We are yet free from pangs, that shall dispel 
The soft enchantments of the sensuous world, 
Ere we are called to leave it. Thou hast seen 
This arm more truly hurl the death-fraught lance 
Than any practised stripling. Well, sir, judge 
Are we not Caesar still ! — only a little weary. 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 37 

CHARICLES. 

Seek stillness, then ; — the only medicine 
To soothe the ill thou bearest. Put away 
This purposed madness of red revelry — 
Relax the cords that bind thy troubled soul 
To worldly pettiness. Withdraw apart — 
For fickle sleep is soonest won alone. 

TIBERIUS. 

Alone ! alone ! — each nauseous drug thou own'st 
Were sweet to such a horror. We have climbed 
The Alpine heights together — grasping oft 
The rugged shrub, whose roots more firmly cling 
To their dead rock, than any gaudy flower 
To the warm earth that feeds it : — thus it is 
When every joy has perished, the starved heart 
Cleaves with its total being to a world 
Barren of any comfort. Solitude ! 
I loathe its deadly presence, and grow sick 
Even as the brain now dreams it. 

Charicles, 
A word apart with thee, that the vexed soul 
May cast the fiend that haunts it. Thou hast dreamed 
Some show of truth in the weak jugglery 



38 CHARICLES : 

Fashioned by priestly knaves to drain their dupes ! 
Perchance to tins foul tenement we hold 
Thy folly gives a subtler principle 
Than self-iiiforrning matter ! Thy faint heart 
Projects its best of being from itself, 
And as a god adores it— as a god 
Cursed and dethroned by all the miseries 
That plough the world thou giv'st him. Nay, no word- 
Till I have scared thee with a prodigy, 
That shall out-wonder thy weak phantasy ! 
Thou hast beheld Apollo's marbled form 
Stand in our hall at Capri-— stand as fixed 
As our strong watch-tower, whose deep-seated base 
Grows to the stable earth. What thought hadst thou 
When this perfection sunned thee with its life ? 

CHARICLES. 

The thought of one whose study contemplates 
Maimed and diseased mankind. In awe I stood 
Before the stone-cast dream, that mirrored forth 
A human form ransomed from every flaw 
Prophetic of infirmity and death ! 
Long silently I marvelled ; — till at length, 
Drawing its fire from the fooled gazer's eye, 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 39 

A consciousness divine inhabited 
This shrine too noble for mortality. 

TIBERIUS. 

This image, sir — mark me, I pray thee now — 
A mass of stone, dead, senseless, chilly, mute, 
Ay, so thou think'st it, — heaved its rigid arm, 
And, as alone in speechless trance I stood 
Before the vital marble, breathed my name 
In voice whose terrible music fills my soul ; — 
Which, for a moment's calmness, must yield up 
The rash prediction to thy doubting ear. 
" God-mocking monarch " — these the very words, 
Echoed by night and day have they not sunk 
Deep, deep into my being ! — " know the doom, 
That tardy justice for her scoffers rears, 
Breaks on thy guilty head. No hand of thine 
Shall place this spotless marble in the niche 
Whereto His destined! This stained island fly — 
Thy friends desert thee — E'en the very stones, 
That thou hast heaped in palaces and towers, 
In fragments strew the earth ! Away to die — 
To die upon the shore whose tainted sands 
Shall shame to hide thee ! " 



40 CHARICLES : 



CHAKICLES. 

Sir, these sombre words 
Were but the fancies of a troubled mind, 
Which, sick with apprehension, turned its dreams 
To horrors palpable. 

TIBERIUS. 

And thus thou think'st them- 
Thou, so weakly duped ! — - 
Teeming with boyish faith, thy heart can feel 
The breath of deity in monstrous forms, 
That strew the bitter earth. In stream and grove, 
The slavish soul thou bearest paints a god, 
Steeped in our human frailties ; — hopes, fears, hates. 
Loves, virtues, crimes, spawned of thy impotence, 
Thou giv'st the natural essence named by thee 
Creator, Jove, or Phoebus ! Doubt this sense- 
Question the miracle these eyes have seen ! 
Hug dead delusions — defraud reason still I 

CHARICLES. 

The studies I have followed, and yet more, 
Such observation as our cautious craft 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 41 

Hails as its best instructor, teach disease 
May trick the eye with fancies, that shall grow 
In the red light of frenzy — from the brain 
Stealing a motion, form, and utterance, 
To cheat the mind that 'gets them. Then distrust 
The false impressions that the senses draw 
From worlds of their creation. But go forth 
When the pure soul, unscorched by feverish draughts, 
Hovers from earth with every fervent note, 
That swells in nature's anthem — there receive 
Undoubting, such belief as the young breeze 
Wafts in upon thy spirit. Know the calm 
That falls so softly on the passive mind 
Is not begot of falsehood ! — know the Power, 
That clothed with life, light, action, sweeps us on 
Towards Beauty and Perfection, is no dream, — 
Howe'er our weak conception bodies it ! 
(A Messenger enters.) 

TIBERIUS. 

Thou art from Capri, fellow ! Are thy galleys, 
That shall to-morrow bear us to our isle, 
Safe anchored in the bay ? 



42 CHARICLES : 



MESSENGER. 

They wait the will 
Of Csesar ; — if again he choose to tread ' 
The spot that Jove has manifestly cursed. 

TIBERIUS. 

Ah, frightened knave ! What say'st thou ! 

MESSENGER. 

That which these eyes have seen. This morning, sir, 

As our calmed vessels slowly float from shore, 

The rock-girt island seemed to toss its bulk 

Like our frail bark when winter's tempest blows. 

Thy stony palaces were bent and swayed 

Like the weak mast we govern. Then the tower, 

Proud, lofty mass that frowns upon the deep, 

Reeling from side to side, quivered and fell 

In thunder on the beach ! — A sudden breeze 

Now rising from the south, swelled our dead sails, 

And bore us trembling from this scene of havoc. 

TIBERIUS. 

Physician, hast thou ears— or are they fooled 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 43 

Like eyes of mine ! Frenzy, thy breath is on me ! 

Wine ! wine there ; bring it quickly ! This grotesque 
Fantastic fable should be quenched and drowned 
With all the sable shapes that flock to it. 
{Ennia returns,) 

ennia (apart to Caius). 
The wine is mixed by Macro — potently 
To lull all pain asleep. I am enough 
Fouled in your service, and will do no more. 
Be thou the cup-bearer, — if yet thy will, 
Uncancelled by remorse, thrust at his life. 

CAIUS. 

I have no fear to act the thing I think 
Like whim-besotted women. Give it me ! 

Caesar, the wine is craftily infused — 
Thus spiced and freshly mingled, marvel not 
That simple men in ecstasy supreme 
Called him divine who gave it ! 

Ennia, see, 
How eagerly he lifts it to his lips. 



44 charicles : 

Soon are we safely anchored to that shore 
That long has fled before our quickened hope. 

CHARICLES 

(advancing, takes the cup from Tiberius, and pours the 

wine upon the earth). 
Give something to the gods ! Thy guilty court 
Dwelt not at Capri when its towers were razed ! 
One poor libation meanly pays such mercy ! 

tiberius {after a pause). 
There is but one of all this scented band 
That durst so honor them. Yet heed thee, heed, 
Lest thou presume too long on friendship past, 
And one day bleed for like officiousness. 

LUCULLUS. 

The festal music that now rings within, 
Calls Caesar to the feast our hasting zeal 
Has heaped to match his order. 

TIBERIUS. 

Life freshens at the sound, and the warmed heart 
Leaps to the melody ! Physician, come, 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 45 

Pour thy libations to a mortal god 

Whom it shall profit something. Have we garlands ? 

LUCULLUS. 

This is the youth who bears them. 

TIBERIUS. 

Crown me, boy ; 
This yielding band of roses soothes the brow 
That aches with costly metal ! 

Is the earth firm ! — 
Methought it shook and heaved but now like that 
He told us of at Capri ! Prodigy ! 
Ye all are stable, while I stagger here 
As one who walks the galley's slippery deck, 
When tempests lift our navies. To the feast — 
We should reel after. Help me on, I say, 
The will of Caesar lives ! — yet fitfully 
It flashes : — Charicles — thy hand — thy hand — 
How cold it seizes mine. Upon thy life 
No word ! on — on — Caesar rules Caesar still ! 

Lucullus, well this thirsty throng shall prove 
The wine your jars have ripened ; while our band 



46 charicles : 

Of dancers and trained singers shall show thee 

What gods we keep at Capri. Ha, our wreath 

Has fallen — Bring another ! Ennia, 

The flush upon thy cheek rivals these flowers. 

Our race, good Caius, ever won the smile 

Of Roman beauty — thou art one of us ! 

The music quickens. Why stand prating here — 

And let the ruddy moment of delight 

Solicit us in vain ! On to our revel ! 

[Exeunt. 



The Act closes. 



ACT II. 

Ennia enters from the villa. 

ENNIA. 

A moment pour thy cooling breath, oh night, 
Athwart my restless bosom. Ye cold stars, 
Freeze up those quickened feelings which at times — 
As even now they do — struggle beneath 
The weight of years and folly. Should the heart 
Still nourish its own venom — fret and waste 
A languid being in the narrow path 
Where custom binds it ! No ; though cramped by man, 
Toyed, wheedled, slaved, at last we break the chain, 
Renounce all mercy, tenderness, remorse, 
And glut our starving passion. Let no dream 
Of rest, revived affection, or of rays 
Familiar hope once flickered, touch the soul 
That fate sweeps on to power ! — 
(47) 



48 CHARICLES : 

Music again 
Charges the air with pity ; — mortal grief 
Pours forth its plaint in harmonies of art, 
Snatches the strolling breeze, and clogs its flight 
Toned with a human sorrow. Hence ! oh hence, 
Thou language of the soul that mocks our life, 
By rumoring a being all refined 
From the dull dross that drags this feebleness, 
Earthward from whence 'twas fashioned ! 

The young moon, 
Bedded in fleecy vapor, streams repose 
Vainly on this torn spirit. Glimmer on, 
Thou passive, icy wonder, which our priests 
Have mantled in a woman's fickleness ! 
Hadst thou the choler, rancor, spite, hate, love, 
That ravens on her breast, thy drowsy beams 
Would sparkle sharply through the scattered night, 
And dumb with awe thy quaking worshippers. 
Sea gust !— who sportest with the floating mists, 
That heave and drift above me — lift my soul 
To wander freely among airy things, 
Grotesque imaginations, that may dull 
This aching need of loving — born to crave, 
Sting, perish, never to be satisfied ! 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 49 

Away thou life most false and incomplete ! 
Yearn, languish all my being ! then create 
Ideal nothings, worthy to provoke 
Thy possible delirium of bliss, 
The energy and madness of thy love. — 
Flit then before me fair, absorbing shape 
Wrapped in unearthly power, — let my life, 
Spurning its selfish action, melt in thine 
And quicken there to ripeness ! 

Loud debauch 
Swells through the opening gates ! Some parasites 
Reel forth to chill their fever- whirling blood 
From the cold breast of night ! This wooded path 
Shall shield me from their banter and light talk. 
(As the doors of the villa open, a burst of revelry is heard. 
Then enter Charicles.) 

CHARICLES. 

Close up your doors again ! Shut drunken mirth 
And mad disorder in the tainted cell, 
That dulls their guilty jangle to the ear 
Of modest nature ! — 

Let me worship here. 
The sainted benediction of the night 
4 



50 charicles : 

Floats softly through her temple. Every breath 

Charged with the fragrance of the blooming earth, 

Wafts absolution to the soul that feels 

All error, foolishness, and doubt apart 

From its true being. We do flaw ourselves, 

So nobly fashioned, deeming we may not 

Wipe out the stain our youthful wildness trucked 

For pleasure coveted. We are not mocked, 

Feeling that man must triumph over sense, 

Which now he combats weakly. Aching, scarred 

At every pore, the clay-enchanting life 

Deserts the baffled soldier ; yet we know 

Those thrusts and buffets that his dying arm 

Drops feebly on his victor, still shall earn 

A life immortal on the painted page, 

That chronicles to the remotest time 

The patriot's fruitless courage ! Oh thou god, 

Or gods, or natural principle of right, 

Which blindly we must worship ! — shall we not 

Receive again unmaimed the soul we lose, 

Battling with evil that has vanquished us ! 

ennia (coming forward). 
Does the physician, doubting his own art, 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 51 

Beseech night's chilly finger to retard, 

And time the throbbing of the hurried heart — 

Even like an unskilled woman ! 

CHARICLES. 

The live air 
Pours subtler vigor through the healthy frame, 
Than any draught wrung from the soothing weed, 
Or quick'ning root, at bitter need expert 
To minister to man. 

ENNIA. • 

Your patient, sir — 
Does he still suffer, play the boy, and mock 
The hand that holds dominion in his grasp ? 

CHARICLES. 

The frenzy of his revel ebbs ; the eye, 
That flashed with fearless lustre, dully falls 
Upon the wanton throng. The lips that late 
(So thou hast seen) flung sparks of ribald jest 
On all that nature hallows, murmur now 
And ooze a childish prattle. Caius Caesar, 
Silenced in wonder, gazes fearfully 



52 CHARICLES : 

Upon his sinking kinsman, — seeing well 
The sudden culmination of his hope 
Outstrip conspiracy and parricide. 

ENNIA. 

There is a mercy yet ! The wretch shall die 
By Heaven's stroke, not ours — Assurance blest, 
I clasp thee ! And perchance before the last, 
His conscious mind may calmly designate 
Our Caius his successor : then we rule 
Untortured by the furies rumor feigns 
Shall haunt usurpers. 

CHARICLES. 

It can hardly be 
The mind shall so resume its healthy function, 
As to prepare in calmness for an end, 
That, recognized, must hurl the startled soul 
Into chaotic torture. Memories past, 
And images of terror, uncontrolled 
By manly will, mingle with present things, 
And in a sore perplexity of sense, 
Crush out the feeble reason. Life will end 
In a vague dream, unbroken into time, 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 53 

While unconnectedly the avenging thoughts, 
Draped all in ghastly horror, dimly flit 
About the jaded brain. So far as art 
Foretells what shall be, by experience 
Of what has been, thus shall the monarch die. 

ENNIA. 

And thus we climb to power ; — power, that will make 

Our lives decay as his ! So we still pant 

For an ideal existence, to supply 

The stimulus to being, which we crave 

To thrust us from this passionless routine 

Of present meanness, folly, and contempt 

At the poor show we witness. The fooled soul 

Must struggle on, — not turn upon itself 

In sickening revolution. Oh sir, say — 

For from thy presence seems to flow a charm 

That wrests the question from me — is there not 

Some cunning trick to turn to harmony 

The discords, harsh and clashing, that repel 

The love, the peace we covet ? 

CHARICLES. 

We are not left 



54 charicles : 

To totter down to death, swayed to and fro 

By every breath of passion. Mastership 

Of our own thought, won and preserved 

Through effort, shall invest the craving mind 

With calmness ; but this faculty divine 

Comes slow and rarely to our fickle race. 

Yet those there are, who can the will command, 

Banish the frivolous degrading doubt, 

And singly turn the workings of the soul 

To one great object. Such a quality 

Is priest and sovereign unto him who holds it. 

ENNIA. 

I recognize a wisdom in thy words 

That we can never reach. To know a peace 

Beyond, above us, is the misery 

That mocks our impotence ! Art thou a man 

So wrapt and crusted in with smoky dreams, 

That no conception of a happiness, 

Not won but hourly grasped at, goads thy soul ? 

CHARICLES. 

Strength to conceive the thing we may not gain 
Shall bless or curse us, at our proper choice. 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 55 

To strive for good, — not to abide in good, 
Is destiny most noble. We are palled 
In our vexed youth to find the thing we love 
Melt from our grasp ; — then, waking, we perceive 
That the hot hope that struggled in the mind 
Repelled the sober blessing nature pours 
Most tenderly on all. Bosomed in peace, 
We prison our own souls, and torture them 
With petty toys Fate dances in the air, 
Which touched, must fade and turn to bitterness. 
{Enter Caius Ccesar.) 

CAIUS. 

Physician, thou hast saved us ! and shalt tell 

The doubting world Tiberius died untouched 

By mortal instrument. He labors now, 

And fights off death but feebly ; and we hope 

Before the last, he shall be urged to name 

Ourselves to take the throne. Our title then 

Cannot be shaken. I withdraw awhile, 

Lest some should say through tricking, and by fright, 

I wrung the crown from him : — but go thou in, 

To witness what my zealous partisans 

Shall plague him into uttering. Men will deem 



56 charicles : 

Thy evidence unpurchased. Tarry not — 
Know it shall profit all. 

CHARICLES. 

I am obedient. 

ENNIA. 

How meekly our sage scholar bows his head 
To win the smile of Power ! His plans, most noble — 
But their expression in the life, how mean ! — 
Nay pardon, Charicles, my shrewish tongue 
Libelled the heart most foully ;— thou art not 
Wrenched from thy course by interest or threat ; 
But envying thee too much, I seize suspicion, 
And doubting thee, loathe less my tarnished self. 

CHARICLES. 

I go to hush the brawling company, 
Who siege the bloated fragment of a man, 
That I have once called friend. Humanity 
Shall not be wholly driven from the wretch, 
Who lingers there, self-filed and desolate ! 

[ Charicles returns to the villa. 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 57 

CAIUS. 

Answer him not ! Check not his shallow whims, — 
For now I prize his presence, who shall give 
The people surety that the steps I mount, 
Are spotted not by blood. 

ENNIA. 

Art thou secure 
If he names no successor, — or another ? 

CAIUS. 

'Tis but a new assurance that I seek 
Of what is now most certain. Grant he dies 
Not naming me his heir — then I shall rise 
By clamor of the army, and paid throats 
Of vassal senators — paid to pretend 
A general call to power ; — yet the sway 
Yielded by act of his I doubly gripe, 
And dare the gods to cast me ! 

ENNIA. 

Yet 'tis strange, 
How in the presence of this Charicles, 



58 CHARICLES : 

Our plotted height of power crumbles to meanness. 

These eager hopes in vapid languor die, 

And my soul feels the weary ache of climbing. 

CAIUS. 

Look on me then, and shelter here thy weakness. 
Think when thy hand shall wield imperial sway, 
When from thine eye, power, like its beauty, flashes, — 
How thou mayst burn, ay, brand with usury, 
Into the hearts of certain jealous matrons, 
Old scorn and spite ! 

ENNIA. 

There, thou hast made me strong ! 
My sinking nerve is fed, and I am thine. 

(Enter Lucullus, followed by attendants bearing 
torches.) 

CAIUS. 

Why do these torches taint the wholesome air 
With their thick smoke ? 

LUCULLUS. 

The Emperor orders it ; 



A DKAMATIC POEM. 59 

For he would drink the wandering breeze of night, 
Yet cannot brook the darkness. 

CAIUS. 

Hath he waked 
From that dull stupor which we thought the chill 
Of instant death ? Hath he named no successor ? 

LUCULLUS. 

None, sir. His sinews tough, tho' wrenched and torn 

By mortal agony, cord in the soul. 

When some essayed to take the signet ring, 

The type of all his power, feigning his words 

Had bid thee wear it, — lo ! a sudden strength 

Poured through the dying frame ; up, up, he sprang, 

With furious gesture cowed the cringing throng, 

And gasped for the physician. Charicles, 

Even at the instant entering, caught the moan, 

And hurried to his side. Then self-abandoned, 

The dotard clove to him as child to nurse, 

And bade him quench the ceaseless fire that scorched 

The citadel of life. 



GO charicles : 



CAIUS. 

Then Charicles 
Would damp this heated reveller in the dew, 
That chills our festal garments ? 

LUCULLUS. 

Craving strong 
For the free air Tiberius uttered oft, 
Ere the physician yielded to his prayer 
A slow concession. Then the fear of darkness 
O'erwhelmed him, and these torch-bearers are sent 
To temper the obscurity he dreads. 

(Tiberius, supported by attendants, enters. Charicles 
follows.) 

TIBERIUS. 

Ay, here I breathe more freely ; and these throbs, 
That beat so heavily the spirit out, 
Are timed to slower measure: I had pressed 
The bound extreme, where human misery 
Tears out a passage through her prison house, 
And mingles with the ether ; but this blast 
Kindles the life within me ; I rule still ! 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 61 



CAIUS. 

Are you not weary, uncle ? The gray haze 

Of morning glimmered on the distant hills, 

Ere your red torches gave the world new darkness. 

TIBERIUS. 

Weary ? no, no ! I'm fresh and strong, good Caius, 
And can outfeast the maddest of you all ! 
Ay, bout and brawl with any curly youth, 
High-flushed with nimble Bacchus ! 

Take away 
These flowers ; — freshened by the dew-fraught air, 
Their odor sickens me. Nay, Charicles, 
Come closer — leave me not — for I would drain 
A portion of thy calmness. Dreams of horror, 
And fears unutterable fix their clutch 
Here, here, even in the heart ! Lo ! I may not, — 
I cannot grapple with their thronging host ! 

CAIUS. 

Mark you, Lucullus, how he mumbles there, 
And whispers the physician. The thick words, 
That quiver from his lips, break on my ear 



62 CHARICLES : 

In music ; murmuring, another hour 
Shall seat me monarch ! — 

Have the messengers 
Sent by the senate yet arrived to greet us ? 
One of our servants passed them on the road, 
And warned their speedy coming. Do the lights 
That flash and hurry through the court below 
Announce their presence ? 

LUCULLUS. 

Some unwonted stir 
Troubles the night ; — no other cause can bring it. 

CAIIJS. 

Come, we will meet this mission ; for to bend 

Most humbly to these reverent senators, 

And their unwashed supporters, is our part, — 

At least to-day : — to-morrow ! — Well, no boasts. 

Come, Ennia, show these vassals what an eye, 

And regal brow, shall dignify their crown ! 

Then follow, friends, and lift your voices up 

In sudden acclamation, when they say 

The senate have preferred me. Bring your torches,- 

For he can die by moonlight. After us — all ! 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 63 

( Gains Ccesar descends the Mil, followed by all but 
Tiberius and Charicles.) 

TIBERIUS. 

Let me lie here. Carpet the chilly earth 
With your thick cloaks ; so, I am patient now. 
Why is this bustle ? The black breath of night 
Is heavy on us yet : — I must depart 
At sunrise, and ere night we shall carouse 
At Capri. Ha ! why go these lights from us ? 

CHARICLES. 

See where the moon rolls back the draping cloud, 
To bathe in modest splendor every leaf, 
That flutters drowsy whispers to the breeze. 
We want no torches ; — let them go unquestioned. 

TIBERIUS. 

Nay, I cannot support the maze of fiends 
That mock me with their laughter ! Bid them return, 
And let their tapers scare these busy thoughts 
That thicken in the darkness, — for their light, 
Warm with domestic memories, should quench out 
These shapes projected from the sable night 



64 charicles : 

In livid streaks of fire ! Yet 'tis most strange, 
This potent fever, which doth shrivel up 
My very life, ay, scalds each separate vein, 
May not blaze forth, and lighting all the world, 
Beacon our race from whelming misery. 

CHARICLES. 

Look up, old man, and with an effort cast 
Thy soul upon the universe. Implore 
The peace that rained upon thy boyish head, 
When, all untented, thou didst purely share 
The spacious couch of nature. For those orbs, 
Whose daily changes, so the learned dream, 
Direct our lives, stream something of their power, 
To bear above the feeble aches of earth 
Their trusting worshippers. 

TIBERIUS. 

Weak, weak, and bound 
So strongly to its loathsome dwelling here, 
The spirit may not mount. The light that streams 
E'en through these darkened portals of the brain, 
Withers the feeble remnant of a life 
That lurks about me. Mutter not of peace ; 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 65 

The very word bruited upon the night 
Scalds the dry lip it passes. Think of him, 
God Hercules, whom the grief-painting Greek 
Gave mighty verse to blazon forth all pain, 
That could be fixed in language ! Dost thou not 
Kecall that misery intrenched in speech ! — 
The virgin-chorus of immortal pity ! — 
Are they not vivid still ? 

CHARICLES. 

Faintly they show ; 
For cares and busy years despoil the mind 
Of its best treasures. 

TIBERIUS. 

Yet those verses now 
Blossom afresh within me, and my grief — 
All that is physical — outwells in words, 
That utter the extremity of ill 
Our shrinking frame can suffer ! But, oh here ! 
Here, in the centre, grows an agony 
That mocks expression : — Thou life-blighting pest — 
Immedicable thought ! thy potent fangs, 
Fleshed deep into the being, rankle on, 
5 



06 charicles : 

And taint with blackest pestilence the blood, 
That trickles through the heart. Oh Charicles, 
Drug, poison, kill, this wolfish Memory, 
That from vacuity coins wretchedness ! 

Why are these voices ? Why went Caius Caesar 
So suddenly from hence ? 

CHARICLES. 

The senate, sir, 
Send, of their gravest members, certain men 
To hail an emperor, and confer with him, 
Touching oppression and high-handed wrong, 
That crimson all the country. 

TIBERIUS. 

Let them chafe 
In their own capitol ! Ill-timed this visit : 
We have no mind to hear their stale complaint. 
They shall partake the doom Procillius knew, 
He and his brother rebels, who would thrust 
Petitions in our face : — Now strongly gyved, 
In Roman dungeons they wear out their lives ! 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 67 

But why went Caius to them ? He will not 

Cringe, twist, and stoop before these reckless dolts. 

I know him, subtle, crafty, troublesome, 

To commoners ; but / have raised him up, 

And, bounteous in my largess, steeped his youth 

In every riot and voluptuous joy 

That sense can hanker for. Peevish restraint 

Harassed his frolics never : he partook 

Each melting madness hot-lipped Pleasure flung 

About our island ! He is bound to me 

By every chain that patronage and gifts 

Can rivet on the man fed by their bounty ! 

They climb the hill — A throng of men I see, 

But none distinctively. Are these the fools 

Who so desire to belch their petty griefs, 

That they must steal unbidden to my presence, 

And after bleed for it ? Well, let them come ! — 

And yet this crowd strikes marvel to my soul — 

Death ! Are those guards of mine, who cheer the traitors ? 

Where's Caius Caesar ? 

CHARICLES. 

At the head he walks, 



68 CHARICLES : 

Clasping the hand of one, whose dignity 
Acknowledged by the rest, proclaims him chief 
And spokesman of this mission. 

TIBERIUS. 

Traitor ! Ha— 
Blast the suspicion ! Let me up, I say, 
For I am young and supple ! Does he dare— 
Or do these clamors thrilling in my ears 
Cheat my eyes also ! 

{Enter Caius Ccesar, Lucullus, guards, Messengers, and 
others.) 
Well, what means this throng — 
Who are these base intruders ? Answer me, — 
Or I shall grow and blaze before your sight, 
Yea, rain down fire upon ye, that shall singe 
With torture exquisite the very breath 
That pants your stale complaining ! Answer me. 

caius (aside to his party). 
Be patient, friends. This burst of dying rant 
Shall harm you nothing — see, he reels and staggers, 
Grasping his servants for support ! Again 
If he demand your business, hide it not. 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 69 



TIBERIUS. 

Speak, Caius ! lest the rage that fills me here, 
Break through the mesh of doubt, and marshal thee 
The way Procillius and his comrades went, 
To clank out treason to the sunless vault, 
That tombs their wretchedness. 

CAIUS. 

Pray you look there ! — 
Come from the throng, Procillius ! follow ye, 
Whom the just senate frees from base restraint, 
And honors as the country's patriots ! 
You threat me with their company, — I claim it ! 

TIBERIUS. 

Is this a dream firm-frozen in the brain, 

That flies not with its ghastly comrades ? Hence, 

Hence, hideous fantasy ! 

Caius, these fiends, 
Whom here thou seest so thickly grouped about, 
Feign treachery in thee — in thee, who knew 
E'en in thy freshest youth each quaint device, 
That goaded luxury could think ; — each subtle tinge 



y 



70 charicles : 

Long-wantoned fancy could to pleasure add 
Was lavished at thy word ! Ingratitude, 
Nay, black rebellion, to thy king and patron — 
Fie ! 'tis too monstrous ! Make a lesser lie, 
Ye torturing powers, for this too gross deceit 
Bounds harmless from me ! 

MESSENGER. 

Listen then to those 
Sent by the senate, to declare the will 
Of Eomans, too long crushed beneath the rule 
Of thy curst monarchy. Though gored and torn 
By foul oppression, Rome has found the strength 
To curb thy dying havoc. She defies 
The carnage-craving dotard, stung to death 
With his own infamies. The noble men, 
Condemned to waste in dungeons, walk our streets, 
Freed by the senate; and, by them despatched, 
We linger here till the quick hours shall give 
Our state a better ruler ; — till we shout, 
Long reign Caligula the emperor ! 

TIBERIUS. 

Delusions fall from me, and fancies melt 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 71 

To bitter truth. Shiver these senators, 

Ye direful pains, more cruel than man's wrath 

Can heap upon his fellow ! lo, I claim 

Your seething ministry to scorch these knaves ! 

Wrench ye and twist the cords that bind their souls 

In mortal agony — but break no thread ! 

Make them groan out eternity in minutes, 

Trail their foul bodies through the jeering world, — 

Rend, shatter, mangle them, that they may know 

A little half of what Tiberius feels, 

And he shall cry you, cease ! — glutted and drunk 

With satisfaction. 

Oh, I faint again ! 
Where is Procillius ! Softly — let me lie 
Here, on the cold wet earth ! Oh, Charicles, 
Wring from the brain these bitter memories, 
From the hot heart draw out this latest grief, 
Though the life follow it. 

CHARICLES. 

Conceive these plagues 
But earth-born fantasies, alike unreal, 
Alike all impotent to grieve or touch 
The manliest part of life. 



72 CHARICLES: 

Throw thy mind upward to the fresh'ning dawn ; 

Mark where the poet Phoebus doth again 

Write his rich fancies on the glowing mists, 

That drape his eastern chamber ! 

How like a lover every burnished rack 

Drinks his young inspiration ! till informed 

And filled with music, the thick harmonies 

Gush forth to charm our world with prophecy 

Of her lord's coming. 

Listen ! the touch of morning on the plain, 

Makes every tree a lyre : Lo, how it sends 

A soothing energy through every vein, 

And pours abundance into weed and leaf, 

Through measureless creation ! E'en to die — 

Once more to mix with the creative stream. 

That bounds exultant in the waking brute, 

Blooms in the flower, and bursting grandly on 

Through heaven's high chamber hurls the blazing globes, 

Twinkled in pallid clusters down to earth 

To blend our fluttering, uncertain thought 

With passionless eternity — to die — 

To breathe in simple confidence the soul 

Forth to embrace the morning — were but sweet 

At such an hour as this J 



: 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 73 



TIBERIUS. 

Tangled in snares — 

With nimble torments rent — 

What words can goad the fancy to depart 

From the vexed bulk that holds it ! I have dwelt, 

Ay, wrestled daily, with such mighty throes, 

As treble singly the extremest plunge 

Of man's conception. I am Caesar yet ! 

Away, and let me up ! for I am strong, 

Strong, to chastise these traitors. Though the breath 

Shall hoarsely rattle in the gasping throat — 

Though the thick words shall heavily presage 

The cheerless end of nature — though the dawn 

Scowls on me — I am strong ! — and do defy 

This rebel senate ! Seize this crazy wretch, 

And his crime-clotted comrades. Come, despatch, 

Then on to Capri ! There we do contemn 

Your saucy insurrection. Pent and walled 

In our strong island, we do hold your threats 

A theme for laughter merely. Barriers 

Shall there defend our frolics, while we send 

Armies to crush and scourge these carping dolts 

Into submission. Come, despatch, I say ! 



74 CHARICLES : 

These guards move slowly ! Are they still ungyved ? 
I cannot see them plainly — Charicles — 
Be near me still — ay, let me clutch this sword, 
For we can fight our younger battles o'er 
If need shall be ! Now lead me to the house. 
Arouse our servants ! All the galleys wait. 
Nay, bustle here, come — come. — Away for Capri ! 
( Tiberius, supported by Charicles and attendants, 
is led into the villa.) 

The Act closes. 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 75 



ACT III. 

Gains Ocesar, Ennia. 

CAIUS. 

We have attained the summit ! All the guards 

Have softly echoed the great cry for us, 

Which we have wrung from Rome. Their voices wait 

The speedy word that shall announce his death, 

To cleave the air with clamor ! We may breathe 

And bask our languid person in the sun : — 

A little moment more shall seat thee empress,— 

Reality absorbs thy haunting hope, — 

And thou canst envy no one ! 

ENNIA. 

Baseless vaunt ! 
Can any gaudy pomp of royalty, 
Or costly harness, which the state binds on 
To those who rule it, satisfy the soul 



7* CHARICLES: 

That restless dwells within us ! Hope fulfilled 
Is but a dream and fable ! 

CAIUS. 

Yet the truth 
Now spurns thy doubting ! See these friends appear, 
Hasting to tell the best. 

(Enter Orassus and Lucullus.) 

What am I now ? 

CRASSUS. 

The Emperor ! 

LUCULLUS. 

Caligula, the lord 
Of Eome, and father of her people, hail ! 

CAIUS. 

Ha, I have grown ; — but not above the friends 
Who were the first to greet me. Well, how died 
The terror-stricken tyrant ? 

CRASSUS. 

In a swoon 
He faded from the earth ; upon his vexed 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 77 

And tortured life, the dreaded shade of death 

Descended suddenly.' His guilty soul, 

Quite vanquished with its griefs, so faintly passed, 

We might not mark the moment. Now his trunk, 

Stretched pale and lifeless in the hall within, 

Is food for mockery and bitter gibes, 

To the poor knaves he lorded. 

CAIUS. 

It is well. 
Did Macro snatch the state-conferring ring 
And purple mantle from him ? These must show, 
And instantly, on his successor — yet — 
Yet I am loth to take them from the body. 

LUCULLUS. 

They are stripped from him. Macro rent them off, 
Crying their richness and authority 
Befit a better ruler ! 

CAIUS. 

Orders were 
To do e'en thus — he is a friend most faithful ! — 
Lucullus, we go in to deck ourselves 



78 CHAKICLES : 

In these god-given trappings. But speed thou, 

Who here art master, to the court below, 

Where all the guards are quartered, where a throng, 

Drawn from the neighboring country, press and flock 

About this reverent mission — quick to hear 

How beats the city's pulse. At once proclaim 

The tyrant's death— and having wasted time 

In question and reply, (for we must robe 

To play the regal part,) lead to this place 

All who may hear thy voice ! Thou hast received 

The Emperor's orders. 

LUCULLUS. 

To fulfil them all. 

{Exit. 

CAIUS. 

Go thou before me, Crassus ; I would not 
Approach him suddenly. Call Charicles — 
Nay, he is here already. We have need 
Of one the people trust, — he must remain 
Till we are strongly fixed. 

{Enter Charicles.) 

Eeceive our welcome ! 
Although we rise like yonder sun in power, 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 79 

Like him we throw our benefits to all, 

To thee as to the others ! Stay awhile ; 

For having seen, ay, and foretold as well, 

This death that is our life — the peevish tongue 

Of scandal cannot touch us, Crassus, come, 

Lead us where lies the decorated scarf 

Of our new state ! We must return a monarch ! 

[ISxeunt Caius Gcesar and Crassus. 

CHARICLES. 

Does the intrepid consort share the joy, 
That she has toiled to compass ? 

ENNIA. 

Joy ! — alas, 
The very word doth shrivel on the lip. 
Well, well thou know'st how empty is the thing 
That we have gained — or seized most shamelessly. 
Are we not limited and hedged about 
When most our schemes have prospered? Screened 

from us 
By the black veil that curtains time to come, 
Lingers our best of life. A jealous hope, 
Crushed love, and honor lost forever, prey 



80 charicles : 

Upon us. Canst thou understand the pang 
Of passions disappointed — canst thou dream 
All that a woman knows, who bears a heart 
More finely touched and delicately wrought, 
Than those who herd about her ! No, alas ! 
Thy stern and healthy holiness of soul 
Can never paint the weary thing it is, 
When the blythe hope and confidence of youth, 
Drain drop by drop away. This intellect 
Outgrows your mock religions. Then to see 
What toys we are to men — to be deceived, 
Cajoled by promises, enslaved, betrayed, 
By flattery insulted ! — this, ay this, 
Is woman's happiest state. Unrecognized 
Her life's young fervor, and her sympathies 
Keen, eager, sparkling with the freshest tide 
Poured from the cup of nature, are repelled 
And stagnate into silliness or crime, 
As she is crushed,— or, burning into power, 
Crushes her wronger ! 

CHARICLES. 

Woman, I perceive 
Through all these bitter words a spot in thee, 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 81 

That the gross clasp of flattery hath not touched. 
Oh could it be, the fatal seal that hangs 
Above this future greatness, might not fall 
To stamp it into being — there were hope ; — 
But now, I fear the breath that feebly plays 
In yon deserted chamber, will quench out 
Thy best of life in parting ! 

ENNIA. 

Hopes or prayers 
Alike are worthless ; for this blotted life 
Hath passed already ; and our Caius stands 
Supreme and perfect master over thee, 
As over all below us. 

CHARICLES. 

No, not yet : — 
For know the semblance of that certainty 
That seats Caligula is counterfeit ; — 
And Caius, like a tinselled player struts, 
To ape the monarch merely. 

ENNIA. 

Ha, deceived ! 
6 



82 CHARICLES : 

Dwells yet about his heart the little heat 

That makes and unmakes men ! Are we then mocked, 

Fooled, fooled, unto the last ! But 'tis not so — 

Or Charicles were near his wretched charge. 

CHARICLES. 

'Twere madness now ; else would the curious crowd 

Press busily about him, and wrench out 

The life that loiters faintly. I must seem 

Deluded as the rest, who parted straight 

From the spoiled body. Yet a trusted slave, 

Obedient to my order, waits beside 

This friend-abandoned couch, and cherishes 

The slow returning life. 

ENNIA. 

Tell Caius not 
What shadows dress his person, when he comes 
To take the people's homage ; or his hand, 
Bloodied enough already, shall dispatch 
This new created phantom ! 

CHARICLES. 

'Twere the same 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 83 

To him, who ever shall be shadow-cloaked 

Nor guess the coarse delusion ; but to thee, 

In whom I note that vivid restless eye 

That looks beyond the present, this weak show 

Shall never harden to reality. 

Then let it fall away — and go thou forth 

Purged and regenerate. Nerve thy saddened soul 

To put away these empty fantasies, 

That trick thee on to ruin. Know, thy will, 

Steeled first in self-denial, may dispel 

These baffling doubts that jeopard all thyself 1 

ENNIA. 

It is too late ! — I know not how to cringe 
Before the god your cunning fellows feign 
To patron trampled woman. For there are 
Enough, too many, faint and weary souls, 
Whom you can hold degraded and content, 
Tickled to mumm and mumble off their strength, 
As the sleek priest directs. My spirit spurns 
This refuge men have built us, and I stand 
Erect to suffer — to despair, perchance — 
But proud to hold reason unravished still ! 



84 CHARICLES : 



CHARICLES. 

Thou hast not found the mission of those lives, 
That swell with power forever barred from action. 
? Tis hard, most hard to learn ; for we do strive, 
Ay, madly throe and grapple with our fate, 
Too blind to grasp the sober recompense, 
That compensating nature ever pours 
"Where she has much denied. The destiny 
Of a proud woman — who hath soul and mind 
Too large to fill with priestly mockeries, 
Which are, and ever will be, man's device 
To busy and to rule her— though it seem 
Most bitter, may beget a sober joy 
Unimaged to the worldling. Battle not 
With thy restricted fate ; but gently yield 
To what has been ordained. Thou hast no room, 
Rightly to show the genius and the strength 
That riot hot within thee ! Some may not 
Spin out their schemes for trapping to themselves 
The glossy reek of flattery, that shall taint 
Those who most fairly win it. Then pass out 
Into the world about us ; — let this sun, 
Streamed through the opened portals of the sense, 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 85 

Caress and ripen all thy sullen mind. 

'Tis only when ambition's galling spur, 

Bound in by cords thick-twisted through the heart, 

Is by long sufferance dulled and deadened out, 

That we receive existence, and therein 

Do learn to triumph nobly. Our despair 

Falls as a mantle as we leave the broil 

For the world's painted honors, and receive 

From nature and ourselves the strength that brings 

A perfect consolation. Ennia, 

I speak no foolish theories ; but have lived — 

And learnt most bitterly the truth I utter. 

Hear me ! nor weakly cast away thyself, 

That may be saved — still saved — from wretchedness ! 

ENNIA. 

It is too late — too late : — A woman's life 
Hath regular degrees to climb or fall, 
And as we press on each, the former sinks 
Behind us. We can never pause or turn — 
Fate whips us sternly on ! Yet sir, believe, 
Could I have felt thy presence ere I stood 
Before the golden gates of womanhood, 



86 CHARICLES : 

I had received these gifts of form and strength, 
To cast aside fragrant with purer use. 

{Re-enter Caius Ccesar, followed by Crassus and 
attendants.) 

CAIUS. 

Are we too soon arrived ! Our court and guards, 
Are they not here to greet us ? 

CRASSUS. 

Nay, they climb 
In glittering mass to hail thee, see, they toil 
And labor to the summit. Now they catch 
Thy regal robe flash welcome in the sun ! 
Lucullus waves his hand — what shouts are those 
That answer ! All their caps leap to the air, 
And hark ! — they cry — " The god Caligula ! " 

CAIUS. 

The god Caligula ! Physician, see 

Where now I stand to shame thy medicines ! 

Unless thy skill find quick'ning for the dead, 

As physic for the living, I am firm. 

The bond is broke that held thy mumbling lord 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 87 

Before the place I craved. This jocund crowd 
Takes little thought of that gaunt spectacle, 
That coldly presses the wine-spotted stones. 
What is the profit of thine honesty — 
Thrust quite, aside, unrecognized, displaced 
Before this sweeping surge of sycophants ! 

CHARICLES. 

We toil to be forgotten ; and at night 

Unnoticed sink to silence. 'Tis decreed. 

The sober daily duties of men's lives 

Win from the world no statues. Yet a tone 

Worthy the chords celestial that are placed 

Harmonious in our grasp, shall ripple on 

And softly range the ages. We must toil 

To be forgotten ; yet not so the good 

Or ill our life shall furnish. That impressed 

On those around us, and by them bequeathed 

To all who follow after, hurtles still 

Through the world's heart of being : therein lies 

Our certain immortality. Reflect, 

Thou future monarch ! dare not trifle now, — 

For every act of thine peals far and wide, 

Its proper note of shame or blessedness. 



88 charicles : 

CAIUS. 

We ask nor drug nor counsel ; thou art kept 

To tell this crowd our uncle was consumed 

By his own foul diseases, not dispatched 

By rumored treason. This thy work ! 'Tis mine, 

To greet these heralds of my dignity. 

{Enter Lucullus, followed hy a crowd of guards, 
citizens, fyc.) 

LTJCULLUS. 

Brothers and soldiers, freed from bloody bondage 
Beneath a tyrannous and galling yoke, 
Lift up your voices — give the heaven your caps — 
Cry, Hail Caligula the Emperor ! 

{A great clamor,) 

CAIUS. 

For this most fresh and cheering welcome, thanks. 
Know we stand here untarnished ; — The grey wretch, 
Abhorred by Heaven, by Heaven has been dethroned. 
Our hands are bloodless ; — and for proof we bring 
This grave physician. Charicles, declare 
Tiberius' death, and how our spotless self 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 89 

Stayed not his breath from lingering to this hour, — 
Our wish and effort were that he should live. 

CHARICLES. 

That wish is granted ! Bend thine eyes but there, 
Nay, 'tis no apparition ! Lift again 
Your pliant voices — See, how strong he walks ! 
Shout welcome to the god Tiberius ! 

(As Charicles speaks, the doors of the villa open and 

discover Tiberius stripped of his royal garments. 

He breaks from an attendant who supports him, and 

comes forward. - ] 

TIBERIUS. 

Palsy these limbs — numb every nerve in death — 

The stifling fury waked by such revolt 

Would vent itself through bones that had bleached out 

A century in the sun ! Then let me grow 

And tower in my wrath until I swell 

To bulk tremendous, and so toppling down 

Crush out this league of robbers ! — 

Caius Cassar, 
Have I not fed thy gross and lawless youth 
With license that is proverbed ! Must I whine 



90 CHAItlCLES : 

And crouch to thee for leave to die — to die, 

As peacefully as dog or slave, unracked 

Save by the easy wrenches of decay — 

Not gored and galled by black ingratitude 

Of a pride-bloated kinsman ! Dost thou hear 

These jangling words denounce thee ? Seize him, slaves ! 

Bind fast this puppet monarch ! — nay, keep place, 

I, who have wrestled with such ghastly throes 

As would have parched an army into dust, 

Can blight him singly ! Ha — now — now,— he melts 

And shrivels at my breath — scorched in the blaze, 

That bursts about my veins, he wails for mercy 

Ay, clench thy teeth ! Pray for thy life to crack ! 

We two shall seethe in agony forever — 

Oh satisfaction ! bitter and most blest ! — 

CAIUS. 

Appalling sight ! Keep this crazed babbler from me ! 

I charge ye, drag him hence ; — for though as mortal 

A terror steals upon me, and I shake 

At this enormous prodigy — yet ye, 

On whom the deadly flashings of his eye 

Are not so thickly poured, may drive away 

This spectre, ay, and stifle out the.. voice 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 91 

That growls these curses on the dizzy head, 
Crowned by your acclamation. 

LUCULLUS. 

Friends, arise, 
It is too late to turn. Come press we on, 
And in a mass bear this sick tyrant back 
Into the hall. The morning sky affords 
A roof too fair for one distempered thus ! 
Your voices given, there is no room for choice — 
Obey the Emperor proclaimed but now ! 
Clear were his words ! Off with Tiberius ! 

\_A great confusion. Tiberius is seized and borne into 

the villa. Lucullus and Grassus follow hastily, and 

after them Gharicles.~\ 

ENNIA. 

So thou hast gained the summit of all hope, 

And leav'st ambition, and that gnawing ache 

After the unattainable, that marks 

The brow, and wrinkles up the soul, far, far 

In the hot plain below ! Incautious man ! 

Thy empty boast still frights the laughing breeze, 

Thy regal stride streaked in the passing mist, 



$'2 CHARICLES : 

Still throws fantastic shadows ! Strive again, 
Again, adore some phantom of the mind, 
By fancy changed to an external thing, 
That lives in thy hereafter ! 

CAIUS. 

Woman, cease — 
This is no time for mocking. We have gauged 
Our bliss too soon ; for it should seem there dwells 
A power beyond us, whose behest can change 
Our certainties to dreams and emptiness. 

ENNIA. c 

Then pause to ponder wisely ; nor despise 
This scathed and blighted warning of a fate, 
That lurks with horror to crush out the reign, 
Blood-stained and monstrous in its infamy. 
And let that spark of highest life to man, 
That hid by bestial riot and debauch, 
Still frets and festers in us, kindle up 
And light thee from the curses of a world ! 

CAIUS. 

Peace, woman ! what we learn by prodigies, 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 93 

That plant their lessons in the living eye, 
Words but dilute and weaken. We are taught 
By hard experience, as the chafing tide 
Smooths the rough pebble to a polished gem. 
Our policy, when once the height is gained, 
Shall work reforms most needed, and restrain 
This court of sottish brawlers ; for I quail 
At thought of end so black and direful. 

ENNIA. 

Build thus thy safety, Caius ; for we know 
In the hot chase for luring dignities, 
Ambition cannot bend to study form, — 
But bubbles onward, as the nimble brook 
Leaps by the flowers that fringe its sedgy bed, 
And hurries reckless to the sea — to find 
The waters salt and bitter, that from far 
Glanced merrily, and beckoned to the hills. 
Oh, keep about thee better friends than those, 
Who now in bloody passion seek the life, 
That nourished all their rankness ! 

CAIUS. 

Nay, these men 



94 CHARICLES : 

Do patriots solemn work, and recompense 
Rich and abundant — rarely patriots' pay — 
Shall line their chests with silver. Yet I keep, 
If princely favors are not powerless, 
This calm physician ; — for 'tis wise to trust 
A royal life to hands unparched by bribes. 
Hark ! how the growing tumult swells within 
And breathes a tone of triumph ! No dismay 
Again shall wrinkle the new day in horror ! 

(Lucullus, Orassus, and Charicles enter. The crowd 
follow in confusion. Among them are those hearing 
the body of Tiberius^ which is cast upon the earth?) 

LUCULLUS. 

Again we do salute Caligula ! 

There lies this pampered and remorseless man, 

The wreck and ghastly refuse of misrule ! 

The flaming lights of lust and cruelty, 

Have one by one gone out. The dazzling beam 

Of mid-day cannot tinge his night to show 

How dead the darkness lies. Come and behold, — 

At length this mockery of humanity 

Hath wearied out his scourgers. 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 95 



CRASSUS. 

And again, 
Caligula, we hail thee sovereign, 
And ruler of this empire ; and we pray, — 
That schooled by this black pageantry of death 
Ignoble and unpitied, — our new lord 
Will tender well the fabric he sustains, 
And purge this Asiatic luxury 
From court and state, before it crushes out 
Our ancient manhood, and that hardiness 
Wherewith the past frowns on us. 

CAIUS. 

But we doubt 
Our right to rule e'en now. Physician, say 
Is he yet past reviving ? — if it be 
He cannot wake to curse me, why, I take 
The title you have offered, and shall build 
With moderation, and determined zeal 
The state you bid me govern. Yet declare 
If dead Tiberius be ! speak, Charicles, 
For on thy word, still shackled to the truth, 
My soul shall float to empire. 



96 CHARICLES : 



CHARICLES. 

Govern then 
In quiet awe ; feeling the weighty trust 
This hour bestows. Tiberius hath lost 
His lease of black oppression : speak we not 
Of his disgraces further. How he died 
I may not wholly answer ; for the crowd 
Thronged thick about the bed, and only swayed 
As something heaved and struggled in the midst, 
More and more feeble grew the frequent throes, 
Till suddenly a stillness fell on all, 
And then the muffled mystery of death 
Shuddered along the chamber ! From the face, 
When Macro first uncovered its fixed lines, 
The startled crowd retreated, — and I saw 
Caligula was monarch. If a doubt 
Still linger, lift that mantle from the brow 
It covers. Thou shalt find a surer proof 
Of thy high place, than human breath can utter. 

CAIUS. 

No let it lie : I will not look again 
Upon this stainer of our race and honor, 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 97 

This Caesar but in title, unallied 

Unto the blood of Julius. Tis declared 

That jealous zeal shall build again our state, 

To simple firmness and contented strength. 

And ye, whose, clamors thrust us where we stand, 

Be near our person, where your fervent cares 

Shall win advantage. Crassus and Lucullus, 

Friends both, are not forgotten ; — nay another, 

By liberal favor, shall retain the places 

That he has filled most faithfully and well : 

Know, Charicles, our bounty bids thee wait 

About us as physician, to protect 

Our life ; as thou hast shielded that he bore, 

Who was thy friend and master. 

CHARICLES. 

Pardon, sir ; 
The intervention of a solemn calm 
Between repose and action, rounds the life 
That nature offers man— and no light cause 
Should break this interval. I sought this court, 
That tender skill of old companionship 
Might somewhat soothe the anguish of a wretch, 
Abandoned to the plots and mockeries, 
7 



98 charicles : 

Of those who shared his loathsome revelries, 

And to the scorn of all. Look ! he has passed 

His retribution — I am needed not. 

In private quiet let me linger out 

A few short days ere my release shall come. 

For even now impressions, newly faint, 

Dislimn and vanish, and before the dawn 

The consciousness bounds into action — quick 

By instinct to devote to life the hours 

That hurry through the closing gates of Time. 

CAIUS. 

Depart then at thy pleasure ! 'Twas our wish 
To cheer with profit, and society, 
The desolation, doubts, and thick'ning pains 
Which are the legacy that Age receives 
To sting him bitterly to craving death. 
But since alone, inactive for the world, 
Thou would'st wear out the remnants of the mind- 
So shall it be — depart in peace and safety. 

CHARICLES. 

Age is not desolate : our memory 
Concentrates on the flash of happiness, 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 99 

That has shot by us, and in mercy leaves 

All else to night, and silence. The serene, 

Pale twilight, vespered by soft-flowing notes, 

That hail the parting of the garish day, 

Melts lovingly to darkness : so the mind, 

That feeds itself with labor, and retains 

In wholesome discipline its tenement, 

Shall fade most tranquilly to pleasant rest. 

Uncramped by pain, — uncrutched by doltish creed, — 

Nature invites the weary to lie down, 

To rest and live at once ; — to rest the thought — 

To charm these jaded pulses of the brain, — 

To dull the face, that burning through long nights, 

Mocks the dark void that shattered love has left ; — 

And yet to live in pure and passive life, — 

To harp the tempest in the vocal oak, 

To gaze undazzled at the face of day 

In the light-craving blossom, — or refined 

To airy vapor, drink the sunset in, 

And rain its golden glories down to men 

In liberal profusion. To the soul 

Uncloyed by narrow fable, unensnared 

By the foul grasp of passion, this, the end 

Of nature, is her favor last and best. 



100 CHARICLES : 



ENNIA. 

And is this all ! thou, who hast studied oft 
The final shudder or the rarer smile, 
As through the languid limbs oblivion 
Diffuses its repose-— has nothing flashed 
To light that grand conception of our race, 
Which builds up temples and inspires song ? 
Shall we not think this consciousness hath life, 
Distinct from form and fabric, and may rise 
An exhalation, viewless near the earth, 
But thick'ning to a shape, as drifting on 
Through thinner air, it basks in light unshrouded ! 

CHARICLES. 

Nay ! this majestic possibility — 

The phantom that the fervid blood of youth 

Imbues with life, or grasping superstition 

Fevers for selfish profit — manly thought 

Fails to redeem from shadow. Our research 

Sees how the soul elaborates itself 

From the coarse nurture that supplies the frame, 

With means to grow and perish ; and we mark 

How they are one, together. We observe 



A DRAMATIC POEM. 101 

A morsel undemanded to repair 

The wastes of daily use, or an excess 

In pleasure or in toil, unseat your gods 

And fashion new religions — shrivel up 

In frowns and cruelty the face of Jove, 

Zeus, Apis, Belus, — or what other name 

Man gives the deity diseases make 

Of that, for which his art can find no shape, 

His language no expression adequate. 

Then blemish not thy future, that shall change 

As damps, or study, or enfeebling lusts 

Mope in the wearied brain ; — but calmly deem 

Perfection is before us, clearly glassed 

In each pure fancy that the heart conceives, 

Yet feels too noble for the wavering will 

To strike into existence. — Our best life 

Breaks from the present, and flows strongly on 

To chafe and fret the barrier, that fate 

Builds round our little knowledge. It may be 

The glowing particle that wields thine arm, 

That loves and suffers through these instruments, 

Shall learn to cast them, — and yet bear and know. 

Or it may be this chance-commingled mass 

Of energy and weakness, shall dissolve, 



102 CHARICLES : A DRAMATIC POEM. 

Again to mix with less impurity 
In other life, built on the best of thine. 
And thus, still changing, purifying still, 
All that is guiltless in thy life shall live — 
Pervading time — coursing its stream forever ! 

CAIUS. 

Farewell physician ! We respect thy wish — 
Depart with honorable furtherance. 
But let the rest now follow us within : 
There shall our plans be faithfully unrolled 
How best to use your gift ; for know ye all — 
Since fate that dallied with our expectation 
Hath lifted us to place — we shall rebuke, 
By clemency and sober watchfulness, 
The grave oppressions that disturb this land. 



THE END. 



NOTE 



(103) 



NOTE. 



To the brief introduction prefixed to the preceding poem, the 
notice of a few incidents is added. 

The action of the Emperor in the circus at Circejus is taken from 
Suetonius. The personal exposure and military discipline of Ti- 
berius when in Germany, are related almost in the words of that 
writer. The cry of " Tiberius to the Tiber," with which the in- 
dignant populace received the body of the Emperor, has been an- 
ticipated. The fancied address of Apollo, and the sudden fall of 
the tower of Capri,^ are suggested in a passage from the same his- 
torian t The arrival of a special deputation from the Senate to 
salute Caligula, although not historical, is by no means improb- 
able. Its dramatic introduction may be justified as the simplest 
expression of the universal feeling of hatred and defiance for the 
dying tyrant, and anxiety for the enthronement of his successor. 
The rage of Tiberius upon learning the release of certain prisoners 
by the Senate, and his resolution to hurry to Capri, and there brave 
his enemies, is taken from the writer already quoted. Both Taci- 
tus and Suetonius name the villa of Lucullus as the place where 
Tiberius suddenly died. As the latter historian gives several 
accounts of the manner of his death, and seems equally doubtful 
about them all) the narrative of Tacitus (as given in the introduc- 
tion) has been followed. The liberal promises and hearty deter- 



* The reader mil have noticed that the modern name Capri has been substi- 
tuted for the Caprece of the ancients. 

t Supremo natali suo Apollinem Timenitem et amplitudinis et artis eximiae 
advectum Syracusis, ut in bibliotheca novi templi poneretur, yiderat per quie- 
tem affirmantem sibi, non posse se ab ipso dedicari. Et ante paucos quani obi- 
ret dies turris Phari terras motu Capreis concidit. 



(105) 



106 NOTE. 

minations of reform with which Caligula concludes the drama are 
strictly in accordance with history. If we can trust Suetonius no 
prince ever began his reign with a more noble and enlightened 
policy, or so devotedly attached to his person those whom he gov- 
erned. A positive insanity has sometimes been suggested as pal- 
liating the subsequent atrocities associated with his name. 

It can hardly be necessary to remind any reader that the uncer- 
tainty regarding a future state of personal existence, attributed to 
one of the characters at the close of the poem, is supposed to come 
from one ignorant of Divine Revelation upon that point. Whether 
a reasonable assurance of such existence is independent of special 
revelation, is a question upon which the author expresses no opin- 
ion — it being sufficient for his purpose that many men of mature 
judgment and enlarged culture have thought it was not. As an- 
swering an objection to the different treatment of this subject in a 
former drama, it may be worth while to remark, that in an age of 
simplicity and faith, human beings swayed by the strongest emo- 
tion of youth — a passion which in its first intensity seems to bear 
the impress of immortality — may arrive at conclusions unnatural, 
in an age of luxury and skepticism, to one long past the period of 
life when the affections govern and absorb the being. 



